Artists work very hard on their work. We have spent considerable time, resources, energy, and emotions in developing our style and “language.” It is ours and it is personal.

In order to be up to date we need to be online. We have to market ourselves and have a web page. If we want to reach out and expand our community we need blogs and Twitter accounts, Facebook fan pages and more.  It’s bad enough when sites like Facebook claim the rights to our images if we post them, but at least we have a choice there.

Many artists do not like to watermark their work because it obscures the image and makes selling online difficult. Watermarks can also look unprofessional.

If you find that you took someone’s work and they contact you, usually removal of said work and a sincere apology is enough.  If the artist took the time to contact you before going to their lawyer then you should be very happy as well as humbled.  Do not behave like this guy http://www.smartplanet.com/technology/blog/rethinking-healthcare/big-mother-gets-her-shot-at-cutting-health-costs/1023/#comments and respond with arrogance and condescension, trying to rewrite the law. Also don’t then write an eye roll worthy article acting as though the guy you stole from is an out of touch jerk like this…http://www.smartplanet.com/technology/blog/thinking-tech/how-to-protect-your-copyrighted-images-on-the-web/3684/.

I don’t know how to get it through to this guy that an illustrator makes money by creating illustrations for articles just like his and ethical professionals pay for those illustrations. As others in those comments said, it devalues the artist’s work because the clients that paid for the work then wonder why they bothered.

Just because something is easy to do does not mean it’s okay. Although now it is very easy to just click and grab a piece of artwork does not mean that artists should not get paid for someone to use it. It means that artists need to be even more vigilant. It means that it is even more important to get permission before using the work of someone else.

If you would like to see more about this particular situation you can find the artist’s reply here…http://drawger.com/buzelli/?section=articles&article_id=10164

Please don’t steal from people and for artists, copyright your work. Better safe than sorry.

P.S By law all my images are copyright. If you want to use my work, ask me.  I’m nice…unless you steal from me. Then I’m mean, very very mean. And while I may be poor (and would love the opportunity to take your money) I do have a lawyer in the family who would love to help me take your money.  Have a nice day.

These are the very first sketches for a children’s book I am working on. More details to come, I just wanted to show what I have been up to besides working at a bookstore and getting ready to move.

I am not the best sketcher, but I think by the time the book is finished I will be much improved. I am also not an illustrator, luckily the author wants what I do instead of illustrations.

Sorry for the very poor photo quality. I am having an issue with my computer. I have to open everything up as an administrator and I can not open up my scanner that way. I had to take the photos with my cell phone. One day soon I will figure out what the problem is and have it fixed.

First the side bar:

1. There is now a gallery in the side bar. It will randomly choose 4 of the images in the gallery every time the page is refreshed. If you click on the gallery the images will load in the center of the screen and you can click the image to go to the next one.
2. Next we have the new book review links. I decided to make a carousel instead of the long list of books. It looks nicer and takes up less space.

The pages edges:

1. On the right hand side you have links to follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr. They are right next to the scroll bar.
2. On the left hand side you have a nice new tool that will allow you to highlight something on my page and then you can make a tiny url and tweet a link to what has been highlighted. Just highlight what you want, take your finger off the left click and go back over what was highlighted.

I hope you enjoy these additions as well as the new layout. I will most likely play around with a few other things over the next few days so don’t be surprised if you come back and something is a bit different.  If you like something and I got rid of it, let me know and I will think about putting it back.

*I stumbled upon this amazing blog as I was cleaning out my following list on twitter. I added quite a few of her suggestions. Instead of using her links though I opened up the ones I wanted to us, opened my blog in another tab and just put in the names of all the plug-ins in the search box. Easy as pie.

1. When you leave a comment check the CommentLuv box and there will be a link to your latest blog entry!
2. I also added the share option so you can link with your favorite social media of your choice.

• 1.the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.
• 2.the class of objects subject to aesthetic criteria; works of art collectively, as paintings, sculptures, or drawings: a museum of art; an art collection.

This is Redgy. He is my clay board experiment.  I must say it’s a bit frustrating to go from the last painting to one that is in the ugly stage right from the beginning.

I have done about 3 steps to this. First is the brown one, second is the black (except eyes and nose) and third is the red and blue. I just put in the eyes and nose after the red and blue. I’m hoping that a few more layers on the rest, to darken some areas up it will look much better.

I think there’s a 50/50 shot that this will come out okay.

Everyone that I have seen use clay board makes it look so easy. LOL. I guess I’m just a paper girl.